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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28598574">I've got you</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/plutosrose/pseuds/plutosrose'>plutosrose</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>bonded [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Sentinels &amp; Guides, Alternate Universe - Sentinels and Guides Are Known, Brief Violence, Bucky Hunt, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 07:28:25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,188</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28598574</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/plutosrose/pseuds/plutosrose</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“They wanted to make more of him,” she said, as though Bucky Barnes was a <i>thing</i> like a coat or a toaster that could be mass-produced on an assembly line. Steve swallowed hard. “That’s the short answer.”</p><p>“And what’s the long answer?”</p><p>Natasha frowned, and pursed her lips. As impassable as she could be, Steve was almost confident that he could tell when something bothered her.</p><p>-</p><p>After discovering Bucky is alive, Steve and Natasha look for him.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers, Steve Rogers &amp; Natasha Romanov, Steve Rogers &amp; Tony Stark</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>bonded [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2034616</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>58</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Stucky Bingo 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>I've got you</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Catch me on Tumblr at <a href="https://omgaflockofbirdsthings.tumblr.com/">omgaflockofbirdsthings</a>. I'm also officially on Twitter at <a href="https://twitter.com/plutosrose1/">@plutosrose1</a></p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Steve didn’t get very far--as soon as he left the small area of headquarters where he was allowed to go, so many sounds started to blend together, blaring loudly in his head. He could hear the woman five floors down calling her dentist on the phone, the man in the lobby asking security for directions, blurring together with target practice on one of the sub-basement floors and the whirs of mechanical drills somewhere even further down.</p><p>His head had been buzzing at a low-grade ever since he’d woken up, but this was even worse--this made his eardrums throb painfully, the noise deafeningly loud.</p><p>Just what was this place?</p><p>He grunted and covered his ears, staggering until he was leaning against a wall, trying to steady his breathing.</p><p>Tony was quick to catch up with him, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and leading him back to the lab.</p><p>As soon as they were back in the lab, the noises pulled themselves apart until they were at a manageable level again. Steve took a deep breath and let his hands fall back to his sides. “What the hell was that?”</p><p>“My guess, and considering the fact that I am a genius, it’s a pretty damn good guess--SHIELD doesn’t exactly want you walking out of here.”</p><p>Steve rolled his eyes. “I’ve been talking about the argument that I had with Fury for like almost two weeks non-stop, were you not listening the entire time?”</p><p>Tony shrugged. “I’ve had things to do.”</p><p>Steve huffed indignantly and crossed his arms over his chest. Although he was back inside the lab where the sounds were mercifully limited to the occasional beep or mechanical whir of the machine that Tony was working on and Tony’s own breathing, his entire body was thrumming with the desire to run. He’d push his way through the deafening noise if he had to--Tony had essentially told him that Bucky was out there, Bucky was alive, and here he was, sitting back in a lab like some kind of fucking monkey that was waiting to perform for its handlers.</p><p>Yeah, he’d had a lot of experience with that one.</p><p>“Look, if you want my opinion, and…” Tony paused, “You’re getting it anyway--you’re going to need a guide to get out of here. Nobody does anything on their own. And you, of all people, are definitely not equipped to try and do anything on your own right now.”</p><p>It was something that Steve had heard a lot in his life, and just because it was occasionally true did not make him feel any better.</p><p>“I’m not going to stay here,” Steve said weakly, and Tony nodded.</p><p>“Yeah, well I wouldn’t dream of trying to keep you here,” Tony shrugged, before he sat back on his stool. “I’m just saying that if you’re going to have a chance out there, you’re not going to be able to do it on your own.”</p><p>Steve raised an eyebrow at him--for the past week, he had mostly just listened to Tony talk about himself non-stop, it was a little jarring to hear him talk about needing to rely on other people.</p><p>As if sensing what he was about to ask, Tony grinned broadly at him. “I’ll tell you the story sometime. It’s pretty fucking awesome.”</p><p>Steve huffed again. “Okay, so then what are you saying? Do you want to come with me?”</p><p>Tony rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I’m not going to be able to help you very much. You need someone who can guide you. You’re not going to be useful to anyone if your crazy sentinel senses are making your brain go to shit.”</p><p>“Thank you for pointing that out,” Steve grumbled, and Tony beamed, evidently not recognizing the sarcasm in his tone. “Since you seem to be the expert in this situation, what do you suggest?”</p><p>“It’s more like...who.”</p><p>-</p><p>That was how the young agent - Natasha Romanoff, ended up in his apartment, staring him down, completely expressionless and unimpressed as she studied him.</p><p>Natasha was fairly young, he thought, with long, curly red hair and moved like a jaguar stalking its prey. He might have run headfirst into Hydra bases during the war, but he was certain that Natasha could have done the exact same thing and nobody would have ever known that she was there.</p><p>She was a little terrifying, and she was going to be perfect.</p><p>“Fury’s going to wonder why you suddenly changed your mind on having a guide,” she said, tutting to herself.</p><p>“I need to find him. If there’s even a small chance that he’s alive, then I need to be doing everything that I possibly can to be able to find him.”</p><p>“Yeah, somehow I think telling the Director of SHIELD that you have a hunch that your best friend from the 1930s who you saw fall to his death might still be alive might be a little hard for Fury to swallow, and that man has seen some things,” Natasha said idly, examining her nails, as though she was waiting for him to come up with a better answer.</p><p>“If he’s ‘seen some things’ then maybe he should know that it’s possible.”</p><p>Natasha laughed, “Well that, and I have a feeling that he doesn’t like you very much. Call it a hunch.” She grinned at him, showing far too many teeth.</p><p>“Are you saying that he might not want to look into something important because he doesn’t like me?” Steve raised an eyebrow. “Could he really stand by if Bucky’s out there, alive?”</p><p>“If it’s not important to national security or if it’s a wild goose chase,” Natasha pursed her lips, and Steve’s stomach swooped uncomfortably. He didn’t care if looking for Bucky had shit to do with national security, and whether it was a wild goose chase didn’t mean shit either--if there was a chance that Bucky was out there, then he was going to do his damndest to be able to find him--end of story.</p><p>He owed him that much.</p><p>“So, what are you suggesting?”</p><p>Natasha’s smile, this time, was much less predatory. “I’ll talk to Fury myself. Smooth a few things over. Get you cleared to leave the building, at least. Then, we’ll go from there.”</p><p>Natasha made it sound so simple--but just thinking of the world outside of the headquarters was nothing short of overwhelming, and Steve had no idea where he’d start looking for him. “Leave it to me, Rogers,” she smiled again, leaning in and pressing her hand against his shoulder, and fuck, if that didn’t make his muscles immediately relax and the incessant, irritating buzzing in his head quiet down. “With me on your side, there’s a lot that you can do.”</p><p>-</p><p>He didn’t hear from Natasha for three days--he’d just about given up hope that he would hear from her at all when she knocked on his door at four in the morning, when he’d been in the middle of getting ready to go down to SHIELD’s gym, which was mercifully on his list of approved locations in the building.</p><p>Her eyes raked over him, landing on the SHIELD-issued exercise shorts that rid up uncomfortably. “Nice outfit. You going to wear that to the airport?”</p><p>“Sorry, I haven’t exactly had a chance to go shopping since being under house arrest,” Steve deadpanned, before raising an eyebrow. “What are you talking about?”</p><p>Natasha grinned and shoved a passport into his hands. “We’re going on a field trip to meet with a friend of mine. Pack your bags.”</p><p>-</p><p>That was the short version to explain why Steve was in a tiny motel in Warsaw, with most of his SHIELD-issued clothes in a duffel bag by the window, while Natasha dumped files and maps out onto the bed.</p><p>It was closing in on midnight, and his body felt especially run down by the time change, but Natasha showed no signs of slowing down.</p><p>She’d had already done more than enough for him, he thought--she’d spoken to Fury on his behalf, she’d helped him with a solid lead (he’d asked her how she’d gotten the information, but she had repeatedly waved him off, saying that ‘it was just a favor a friend of mine owed me, don’t worry about it, not like I was going to use it for anything else,’ as though that was going to make him stop asking questions completely).</p><p>She’d sat next to him on their flights and had repeatedly touched and held his arm, calming his nerves and bringing the world back into focus. With Natasha at his side, he wasn’t completely overwhelmed by a deafening blend of noise or how bright and colorful the world outside of SHIELD’s sterile and blank facilities were.</p><p>“You’ve already done plenty for me,” Steve said, though while his attention had been to dismiss her as soon as they got out of the United States, he found that at every turn, she shrugged him off. “You don’t need to do this for me.”</p><p>Natasha hadn’t stopped unfurling maps or smoothing out wrinkled photographs. She smiled a little. “Who said I was doing this for you, Rogers?” She lifted one photograph up to the light - a black-and-white cityscape, Dallas, 1963, and tapped it thoughtfully, before she placed it down on the bed, and pulled another, one that said ‘Tehran, 1974’ over to rest next to it.</p><p>Steve opened his mouth to contradict her, and then closed it when he realized that he didn’t know how. “What are you talking about?”</p><p>Natasha looked up from her work and smiled a sad, wistful smile. “Let’s just say I owe him.” She immediately looked back down at the photographs, brow furrowing together.</p><p>And Steve, for once in his life, decided that it was probably better not to pry.</p><p>When Natasha had finished, there were ten photographs in all, lined up in a neat row on the worn comforter. Steve blinked down at them. “There’s a few gaps,” she said, tutting to herself. “Particularly after the end of the Cold War. He was in El Salvador, and then abruptly disappeared. That was ‘92.”</p><p>She flipped a photograph over, and the sight of it alone was enough to make Steve’s stomach churn. Bucky was in the background, barely more than a shadow, but in the foreground of the photo was an open grave, bodies limp and tangled together.</p><p>“Is he here?” Steve managed to ask, breath catching in his throat.</p><p>Natasha drew her mouth into a tight line. “Maybe. I don’t know--we’re here because I have some friends who might be able to fill in the gaps for us. I was able to find a lot of information, but there’s still too much missing. There was a desk in the CIA that was devoted to gathering intelligence on him and the program, but it was shut down after 9/11.”</p><p>“Program?” Steve raised an eyebrow, and Natasha shoved a packet that was mostly in Russian in his hands.</p><p>He had learned more than a few Russian phrases during the war, but it wasn’t enough to read what he was pretty certain was a highly technical manual. “What is this?”</p><p>“They wanted to make more of him,” she said, as though Bucky Barnes was a <em>thing</em> like a coat or a toaster that could be mass-produced on an assembly line. Steve swallowed hard. “That’s the short answer.”</p><p>“And what’s the long answer?”</p><p>Natasha frowned, and pursed her lips. As impassable as she could be, Steve was almost confident that he could tell when something bothered her.</p><p>“The long answer’s a bit more complicated. I’m afraid that when we do find him, he’s not going to be the same person you knew,” she sighed. Steve furrowed his brow.</p><p>“What does that mean?”</p><p>Natasha shook her head. “We should probably get some sleep before the meet tomorrow--” she started, heading in the direction of the bathroom, before Steve caught her arm.</p><p>“What does it mean?” he repeated.</p><p>Natasha frowned again. “If what those documents say is accurate, then they tried to repeat the experiment that made you into a sentinel. But considering the fact that Barnes was already a guide…” She trailed off, her lips pursing together again into that tight line. Steve didn’t know what that meant, but it couldn’t mean anything good.</p><p>Steve let his hand fall, and slumped down on the bed.</p><p>“It’s not your fault,” she said gently, but Steve just shrugged and moved to the bed closest to the window. It wasn’t the best idea to move as far away from her as possible--especially when Nat’s touch was grounding him--but he couldn’t stand the idea of being close to anyone. Not now.</p><p>No, now, he wanted to curl up and let himself be completely overtaken by the noises in the street below.</p><p>“You said it yourself, we need to get some sleep.”</p><p>“Right,” Natasha blew out a breath. “Let’s sleep.”</p><p>-</p><p>When Steve woke up the next morning, Natasha was already dressed, “I’m going to see my friend,” Natasha said, zipping up her sweatshirt. “You coming?” There was a glint of amusement in her eyes, like she couldn’t believe that she’d woken up and gotten ready before someone who was known to frequent SHIELD’s gym at four in the morning.</p><p>“Yeah, of course,” he nodded without hesitation, leaning over to grab some clothes out of his duffel bag.</p><p>He squinted at the light streaming in through the window, almost blinded by its brightness. “What time is it?”</p><p>“A little after six,” Natasha said, gathering her thick red hair into a ponytail. “I figure we get some breakfast before we go to the square and become unofficial tourists for the day. At least that will be our cover for today, so try to look...amazed by everything.”</p><p>“Yeah, that’s not going to be hard,” Steve snorted as he pulled on a sweatshirt, cap, and glasses that Natasha had shoved in his hands after they’d cleared airport security. He could have sworn that he saw her smile a little in response.</p><p>-</p><p>Being tourists for the day meant eating a mountain of kolaczki, licking powdered sugar off of his fingers as he eyed the other pastries in the glass cases at the bakery that they’d stopped at for breakfast, and wandering through the streets, taking in the way that many of the buildings seemed more perfectly preserved than the last time that he’d been in Poland, crawling through mud and blood.</p><p>The sun had risen higher in the sky by the time Natasha checked her watch a fourth time. “I think it’s time. It’s probably best if you hang back a little.”</p><p>Steve’s lip twitched. “What makes you say that?”</p><p>Natasha’s lips curled into an amused smile. “Because when you talked to Fury you got yourself locked inside SHIELD headquarters and because when I talked to him, he let you off house arrest. Besides, you don’t speak Polish, do you?”</p><p>“A couple of words--” he started, before Natasha raised a perfectly plucked eyebrow at him. “Okay, but you’re not getting rid of me that easily. I’m not going to just sit around while you’re doing something important.”</p><p>“Of course, Rogers,” Natasha grinned, the same Cheshire Cat grin that, in the short time that he’d known her, had the effect of putting him a little on edge. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”<br/>
-</p><p>In the middle of Old Market Square, it was easy for them to disappear into the crowds. Natasha held his hand tightly, occasionally loudly saying things like, “Oh, we should make sure that we get some pictures for your parents!” whenever it looked like there might be someone lurking too close to them.</p><p>In the distance, he could see a man lurking by the Pomnik Jana Kilińskiego, a prominent statue in the square. He was smoking and looking at his watch, but occasionally, he looked over at the two of them.</p><p>“Is this...completely safe?” he asked, unable to ignore the way that his stomach was tying itself into knots. Maybe it was nothing, maybe it was just his reaction to being outside of SHIELD headquarters in a world that he could barely recognize, or maybe there was something to his suspicions about Natasha’s friend.</p><p>Maybe it was because he could feel the way that the man’s heart was speeding up, even at a distance, anticipating something that had to be beyond a conversation--beyond something that he’d been trained for.</p><p>“Are you sure about this?” he asked--and Natasha just grinned at him.</p><p>“Are you worried about little ol’ me, Rogers?”</p><p>He turned a little red, but that didn’t do anything to stop the feeling in his gut that things were about to go incredibly sideways, incredibly quickly.</p><p>For a moment, he was distracted by the appearance of a man on the other end of the square --but as soon as Steve had managed to spot him, he disappeared again back into the crowd.</p><p>Steve furrowed his brow.</p><p>He followed after her, only to recoil almost immediately, desperately trying to find his footing on the cobblestones. Just like when Erksine had been killed, he heard the gun fire almost before it happened, and the explosion was no different. He can feel the blast, the shockwave of energy--fuck, he can practically see it.</p><p>Natasha was closer to it by only a few feet, and turned back to face him right before it happened, as though she can tell that he’s trying to warn her, what’s about to come. But he’s too late, because the force of the blast makes her collapse, and another man that he’d seen smoking by the Pomnik Jana Kilińskiego hefted her over his shoulder and disappeared into the clouds of smoke.</p><p>The man appeared again, this time wrapping his arms around his shoulders, cradling him as his eardrums throbbed and threatened to bleed. There was something under the surface of this man’s skin that felt so familiar, and at the same time, very different. It was only when he looked up that he got the shock that he’d gone halfway across the world in search of.</p><p>“Shh,” Bucky murmured, clamping a hand against his mouth.</p><p>During the war, this amount of contact would have practically lulled Steve to sleep with how calm it would have made him feel. Now, though, he could feel something deep in his veins and his muscles, something that wasn’t supposed to be there.</p><p>“We have to move,” Bucky murmured into his skin, his ears still ringing something awful. He wasn’t sure how he’d heard it in the first place, but his focus when it came to Bucky had always been heightened, and it might have been possible that applied to his hearing too, even after a blast like this one.</p><p>All around him, Steve could dimly hear the screams, see the shards of broken glass and the dust, smell the blood.</p><p>He clung to Bucky helplessly as he hauled him to his feet. “It’s okay,” Bucky said. “I’ve got you.”</p><p>“I’ve got you.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I've got you<br/>Creator(s): plutosrose<br/>Card number: 012<br/>Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28598574<br/>Square filled: A4, Deaf/Hard of Hearing<br/>Rating: T<br/>Archive warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply<br/>Major tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Sentinels/Guides, Alternate Universe - Sentinels and Guides are Known, Bucky Hunt, Brief Violence<br/>Summary:</p><p>“They wanted to make more of him,” she said, as though Bucky Barnes was a <i>thing</i> like a coat or a toaster that could be mass-produced on an assembly line. Steve swallowed hard. “That’s the short answer.”</p><p>“And what’s the long answer?”</p><p>Natasha frowned, and pursed her lips. As impassable as she could be, Steve was almost confident that he could tell when something bothered her.</p><p>-</p><p>After discovering Bucky is alive, Steve and Natasha look for him. </p><p>Word count: 3,188</p></blockquote></div></div>
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